You are speaking kind of loosely. The tension integrated along their length give us the energy which is equal to their mass. Is this a pulling tension or a pushing tension? And what gives rise to this tension? Does the tension come from the space-time metric trying to adjust itself to some "normal" condition? Thanks.

forgive my lay-person-ness- but my understanding of strings is that they are like tire-tracks- in that they are an emergent effect of the intersectoon/interaction of more fundemental items/processes/relationships- like "sums-over-world-sheets" or something?